1 Computer
OS wars, Evil empires and the FutureHistory of computing mid 70's onOnce upon a time there were many p.c. operating systems. The market
developed and IBM saw its potential. They developed a machine, needed an
operating system, and went to silicon valley. The guy they wanted was unavailable,
they went down the road to Bill Gates and Bill (who hadn't got one) licensed
one from someone else. Microsoft's first big lucky breaks.There were far better operating systems around at the time but now
only Apple and Amega survive from that era.The industrial might of IBM (with microsoft hanging on to its shirttails)
destroyed the rest.Ibm pc's had imitators, DOS had imitators as always happens in a
developing marked.It wasn't all plain sailing . Apple had a far better but overpriced
product, and unfortunately for them,they didn't license their technology or fill their orders. Microsoft
had plenty of trouble of their own. DOS mutated rapidly to keep the clones
at bay (Microsoft had also licensed a version of unix and they combined
much of it into their simpler DOS to beef it up) (so much for innovation!).
To catch apple, they needed an easier user interphase. Microsoft developed
windows as a point and click layer on top of DOS. The whole system nearly
collapsed under its own weight and barely crawled along but was simple
enough to use. Apple brought a court case, windows looked too like their
system. Apple lost.Microsoft also worked with IBM on a successor to DOS called OS2
in the late 80s. It was way better than the early versions of windows but
microsoft did everything they could to scuttle it as they migrated their
software developers to windows. OS2 needed good hardware and only succeeded
in a major way in Germany.For some reason, during the beta testing of windows, whenever a
dos clone was used as the carrying layer, an error message came up and
the computer refused to run. This error message, more than anything else,
destroyed the dos clones. The public would never chance them again.There was a big court case over that one too ( settled with microsoft
paying undisclosed damages to one of the dos companies ).This was the crucial breakthrough for microsoft! Suddenly
microsoft DOS had no rivals and a passable user interphase
and
a
huge captive market. The consumers were captive, the chipmakers and applications
makers were captive. Windows still mutated but now the mutations were called
upgrades. Microsoft, having a head start and giving more detailed access
to their own software developers, made more reliable applications for windows.
Companies making competing applications, sometimes found that they had
to pay a higher price for the operating system when they were putting their
own product on than if they just bundled microsoft products! Dell sells
some computers in Europe without operating systems (for the linux community
who install their own OS), they sell the identical computer with windows
for the same price! People ask" is windows free then?" and that one is
in court too! Evidence of microsoft arm twisting? Of course!Prove it. Very difficult.The destruction of Netscape (the company) is evidence of just how
strongly microsoft guard their monopoly. I do most things through my browser,
like many other people. I do not need a huge operating system to use it.
The next version of windows is, as far as I know, using internet
explorer as its user interphase. Say goodbye to your browser choice now!What hope for the future?Everybody is trapped in the Microsoft Feudal System. Great companies
like IBM must do as they are told or else. Revoke a windows license to
a computer company and it dies. IBM is especially harshly treated by microsoft.
Its windows license is more expensive solely because it competes in many
sections of the computer market.There is some hope.Linux is developing so rapidly. It is almost level with NT now.
Impressive for a system that is less than 10 years old.Star office is free and Sun gave away 2 million of them in a few
weeks. Full office system free!A payback for microsoft breaking the license rules for suns java
language perhaps.Must be hurting microsoft.The major mobile phone companies have come together behind another
system, EPOC and that should be enough to secure it as the OS for mobile
users. (As opposed to windows CE.)Palm computing has signed license deals with Symbian (the EPOC consortium)
so the rest of the world is now lined up against microsoft. Intel doesn't
care. They make chips for both sides.Sony and Nintendo may have an online segment in there next generation
machines. Games machines are comparable in power and faster than most higher
end computers.And finally, the justice department investigation. Hopefully a splitting
of the company and hefty fines will be the outcome.The natural order of things is for there to be 5 to 10 companies
dominating a market. This order may reassert itself as the market matures.
Hopefully the market will split into many pieces, and there will be room
for many companies. None of whichhas a stranglehold. Hopefully.The latest in the computer wars is that microsoft have reinvented
the java programming language and called it C#. The hope is to starve java
of developers and to keep them stuck to microsoft. C# would work with all
computer operating systems but work Better with windows.
Just like when Office worked a bit better and won.

Page Contents2. Genetic engineering textThis is the slightly changed text
of a letter I wrote to a newspaper a few years ago. (They Printed)In the "Free Market", big companies use every cudgel
at their disposal to beat down or buy out the opposition. Monsanto is acquiring
seed companies all across America because of their killer app. (patented
resistance to their herbicide). Monsanto gene technologies actually mirroring
this action on a molecular level.Read on:
The current debate about genetically engineered plants is interesting
but I would like to approach it a littledifferently. Round-up, the weed killer in question is generally
recognized as one of the safest and I haveno quibble with that. Producing food plants which are resistant
to it sounds like a great idea. However,glyphosate (the active ingredient) is a plant hormone many millions
of years old. Monsanto didn't inventit.The genes which bring resistance to glyphosate are probably as old
as the hormone glyphosate. Themonsanto scientists merely shunted it from one organism to another.Because other plant breeders in America and in Europe do not have
access to this gene, suddenly all theirvarieties are "old hat". Many of their varieties are undoubtedly
superior in many other respects to themonsanto seeds. Much of this variety in food plants will disappear
as monsanto seeds dominate. Manymore weed types will be defeated too. I have seen the number of
weed types dwindle rapidly on myfather's farm over my lifetime. One which still survives in some
numbers we know as "lambs quarters".1500 years ago, it was an important part of the human diet in the
British isles! It has no resistanceto glyphosate.In the tough and changing genetic competition of today, I have no
doubt that the glyphosate resistancegene will wipe the thousands of genes of this weed and others
like it off this planet. (And the genes offood plants unlucky enough to be owned by rival companies).
A thousand small seed companies aroundthe world might save some of this genetic material. One big one
certainly cannot.This development is a disaster the future of mankind.Monsanto have too big of an advantage here. They will win. Everybody
and everything else will lose.The rules must be changed and their monopoly must be broken. The
future will be much the better forit! I wrote
this letter regarding the glyphosate resistant gene in sugar beet in Ireland.
Irish sugar beet is bred by several different European companies. I think
that a Swedish company has had the most success in suiting Irish weather
and soil conditions. I do not think it has access to the glyphosateresistance gene. So even though their seeds are best suited, they
cannot survive the competition!It has only recently come to light that other gene technology (a
bacterial gene that produces poison that kills insects in corn crops) has
unexpectedly been killing monarch butterflies which eat the pollen from
the corn.I do not think for a second that this effect was unexpected.
They probably thought that it could be glossed over by the public relations
department. (and perhaps it can!). What hope for bees and fruit crops?

Page Contents3 Monsanto is the great threat to the future.In less than a decade, they have got North America to the position
where many food crops grown in the States and Canada are transgenic, patented
and owned by Monsanto. North Americans are eating foods contain natural
pesticides from bacteria and wild plants. Nobody has tested these new plants
for harmful effects. It can take 10 to 15 years to do proper long term
studies.Why are they not labelled in the supermarkets?Why have the normal procedures been relaxed in one of the least
understood segments of Science?Why are the genes of life being patented? Companies are even applying
for patents on parts of the human genome!This has gone too far and too fast.The American Government will now try to force European countries
and others around the world to let the stuff in to their supermarkets.
The world trade organization is their vehicle to achieve this.A consumer revolt in Europe forced shops there
to ban this food.Beware of government by big business for big business. American
farmers and universities are now serfs to the giant
monsanto monster. The US and Canadian Governments seems to be acting
out their wishes too. Are they acting for you?Page contents4.
History of water power (pulser pump included)

Air lift pumps are in widespread use behind the scenes. Tromps (the power producing half of a pulser
pump) have almost completely disappeared.Here is the explanation.

Hydro
power operation systems
The incomplete story
(Apologies to apple, unix, microsoft and all the rest).Vertical Axis Water Wheel The first really
successful water powered device. A small water wheel, lying on its side
in a flow of water, turning a vertical shaft. It was used in small run
of the river water mills. It was used extensively from Roman times up to
perhaps 1200 ad or so.applications grinding cereals and spinning
woolUndershot Water Wheel Perhaps a
little more efficient and more clog resistant. Delivers more torque because
they generally have a larger radius. Run of the river option from 1200
ad on.applications grinding cereals and spinning
wool.Overshot waterwheel More efficient at around 60% and used
to utilize larger heads of water(generally 2m or more). This means that overshot waterwheels could
be (generally) a minimum of 5 times more powerful thanan undershot wheel in the same place. 1700-early 20 centuryapplications They could drive a multitude of machines in much larger
integrated mills, be they grain mills, textile mills, or machine
shops. They helped start the industrial revolution.Hydraulic ram pump Very efficient (80%)
hydro powered water pump .application pumping water ( limited number
of applications is the problem)Tromp Used in the 19th century to provide air
to power pneumatic tools and to ventilate mines in the UK and elsewhere. Tromps powered jack hammers to dig alpine tunnels in both
France and Switzerland. And DC generators (powered by air from tromps )
generated the light in expensive apartments in Paris in the 19th century.applications pneumatic power for tools and
motors. Development killed off by hydroelectricity. The water pump application was never developed at the
time.Hydraulic motors. High head local power
can be used to spin a pelton wheel that is attached directly to a
variety of shop tools.applications power for any mechanical tool
locally.Hydro electricity The killer application! Hydro
electricity started in the late 19th century and the combination of
efficiency andtransportability proved to be the killer of all the other Operation
Systems.The grid (or net) meant convergence with other forms of generated
electricity.Hundreds of applications sprung up and electricity became the O.S.
of choice for everybody. Electricity everywhere! becamethe battle cry of the triumphant electricity companies. (Just like
now with windows everywhere!).The other operation systems still existed but only in tiny niches
lost in the backwoods.

Hydro power operation systems
The FutureHydro electricity has taken all the high ground and middle ground.
What's left? Lots!Now, just like in computers, (Amega, Beos, EPOC, Linux, Palm)
alternative operating systems are reviving. Hydro electricity is not without
problems. Silting of dams,fish migratory routes disrupted, land flooded. Power lines everywhere.Lots of power is available in a low head environment. Often in riverside
towns where local applications abound!Pulser pumps can power fountains, aerate the sewage treatment facility,
and they aerate the river itself!, they can collect andremove silt from the river (modern living has greatly increased
erosion rates so we should take some back), They can pumpwater from the river in times of flood (modern floods are bigger
because all drains are straight and excess rain goes straight toflood. Years ago, rain usually soaked into the soil first and the
floods rose more slowly). All the other applications, washing sand, ventilation
etc. can be developed. It's easy to use all the power from a pulser pump
in that town.Not only that, the river benefits from the input of oxygen.The end user efficiency is not going to be dramatically different
from that of hydro electricity from that same low head source.The costs however will be dramatically lower. It should be an obvious
choice but people are blinded by the one operating system mentality.

5 Microsoft and
freedom to innovationMicrosoft made a whole industry about their freedom to innovate.
They really mean freedom to muscle in.Consider mobile phones. Soon they will be smarter. A company
called symbian was formed a few years ago to make an operating system for
mobile phones. They used a very fast reliable and lean operating system
from psion as their base and the backing of the makers of about 75% of
the mobile phone makers in the world. Their lead over bulky slow wince
was so big that many people thought "its over, no chance for microsoft!"
The microsoft phone design will be called stinger and the symbian phone
design will be called pearl. It now looks like microsoft might get a phone
to market first! (I should point out that Symbian have 2 larger phonecomputers
(not the pearl design yet) selling now (from Nokia and Ericsson). Pearl
will be half the size with almost the same power.How did microsoft catch up? First of all they sucked away as many
of the senior staff as possible to their pocket pc division. A bit like
cut copy and paste, I suppose. The loss of these people caused disruption
and loss of continuity, and there can be no doubt that some intellectual
property got sucked away too. If you put inaudible symbian and microsoft
into a google search, you should get some strange details about the staff
poaching.Then Symbian had to figure how to get the phones to communicate
with windows PCs. That was really hard because it was not in Microsoft's
interests to help them. (If microsoft was split in 2, the OS company would
be only too happy to get more business). It took weeks.There may be more problems in the future for Symbian.
What if microsoft make it difficult for symbian phones to communicate with
their windows 2000 servers. They wouldn't do that, would they?I am afraid that they will if they are let.The Blue mountain card case shows what they are capable of.
Blue mountain make free greeting cards for email.They found very suddenly that many went missing in transit. How
could that be? They were been filtered out as junk mail! Microsoft software
was responsible. Interestingly enough, a microsoft greeting card division
was just being launched. It took a court order to get the blue mountain
cards through and despite the effort to crush them they still survive.......http://www.zdnet.com/eweek/stories/general/0,11011,377634,00.html
gives more details about that rotten episode in business history.EmailPage ContentsHome
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